When I got a call late on Wednesday night, 7 November, from a contact telling me about a woman who had died in hospital in the west of Ireland – having been miscarrying an unviable foetus and having asked repeatedly for a termination – I suspected it could be a big story. If it were true, the political and constitutional implications for Ireland were enormous. What I was not prepared for was how the death of this young Indian Hindu woman would cause consternation across the world.

Abortion is absolutely the most emotive, divisive issue in Irish society, cleaving not only political parties, but workplaces, groups of friends and even families. Successive governments have avoided confronting it, avoided its reality in Irish society – more than 3,000 women a year leave Ireland to have an abortion, usually in England – and avoided acknowledging it through the provision of legislative leadership. The death of a woman in such circumstances was probably inevitable given the lack of clarity about when an abortion is or is not legal here. Savita Halappanavar's death has been explosive.

That a woman had died in this fashion was all my contact knew. No name, no dates, but a number for someone who knew a little more. I called that person, who knew only that her name was Savita or Sabita "or something like that". By the power of Google and with the words "Savita" and Galway", I found her death notice on the Irish website RIP.ie, giving her full name, Savita Praveen Halappanavar, and her full address. I also got a few numbers for members of the Indian community in Galway, in the hope that someone might know something.

Among those I called was a consultant orthopaedic surgeon, long-standing member of the small Indian community in Galway and a close friend of the young couple. Dr CVR Prasad invited me to his home in Spiddal, a village about 10 miles outside Galway city. He had not only the full story of what happened, but also husband Praveen's phone number in Karnataka state, India, where Savita had been cremated and laid to rest four days earlier.

It was about 1am in Belgaum when I called Praveen. I told him I could call him the following morning as it was late. "No," he said, "I will talk to you now." A quiet, gentle, heartbroken man told me the story with which many across the globe are now familiar, of how he had brought Savita to Galway University Hospital with severe back pain on 21 October, how they had been told she was miscarrying and it would all be over in a few hours. She went on to endure almost four days of physical and emotional "agony".

Her repeated requests for a termination were refused, he said, as the foetal heartbeat remained. And he said they were told this was so because "this is a Catholic country". The foetal heartbeat finally stopped on the afternoon of Wednesday 24 October, the womb contents were removed and Savita, having contracted septicaemia and E coli, died just after 1am on Sunday 28.

"What is the use in being angry?" he asked me. "I have lost her. I'm talking about this because it shouldn't happen to anyone else. It was all in their hands and they just let her go. How can you let a young woman go to save a baby who will die anyway? Savita could have had more babies."

Whether the fact that Savita had been refused a termination was a factor in her death has yet to be established. Following the normal rigorous legal vetting, the story was published last Wednesday, on the front page.

The immediate calls from the Irish media were expected. The calls from CNN, the BBC World Service, Channel 4 News, Sky News, the Sydney Morning Herald, France 24, New Delhi Television and more were not. There was more traffic on the Irish Times website that Wednesday than there has ever been and as of last Friday evening the story had been opened online 700,000 times, making it easily the most-read story in the Irish Times's online history.

Last Wednesday evening, a spontaneous protest took place outside the Irish parliament, organised on social media with about eight hours' notice. Up to 2,000 people were there, some weeping, others holding placards with "I have a heartbeat, too" written on them. The reaction to Savita's death was instant, phenomenal and universal. Here in Ireland the feelings were of anger, deep sadness and shame. Outside Ireland, the reaction seems to be of horror, concern and bewilderment.

The fact that Savita was not Irish has been central. If she had been Irish, I believe the international reaction would have been more muted. The domestic sense of shame would not have been so great. We Irish like to think of ourselves as an eternally welcoming people who look after our visitors and yet it seems we let her down at her most vulnerable moment, when she needed care most.

If she had been Irish, perhaps the international reaction would have played out with an underpinning sense that, well, that is what Ireland does to its women. But the line from Newsweek to Channel 4 News to New Delhi TV has been: "Did Irish abortion laws kill this Indian woman?"

Being six hours ahead, India's reaction found its full voice on Thursday. It has been of fury, with protests outside the Irish embassy in New Delhi and Savita's parents quoted widely across the media accusing Ireland of having "murdered" their only daughter and youngest child. As the Indian Ministry for External Affairs expressed its "concern" that an Indian citizen could die in such circumstances, the Irish ambassador in New Delhi moved to meet government officials on Friday in an effort to placate concerns. Ireland has big trade ambitions with the sub-continent and is wary of anti-Irish sentiment developing there.

The pressure for something to be done about the legal morass around abortion is greater than it has ever been – not only domestically but this time, it seems, from across the world. Praveen Halappanavar, a quiet-spoken, gentle young man who was so determined to tell me what happened to his young wife, may yet prove the loudest voice those seeking change here have ever had.